For the Everyday Ordinary...

"Normal Day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all in the world, for your return." ~ Mary Jean Iron

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Such a tease!

We had such a glorious weekend! Open windows, gorgeous sunshine, balmy temps - we filled it with outdoor things, like washing the cars. Actually, my hubs washed the car while I did useful things such as make a tiny snow person with the last little oasis of snow:

He also got me out of the house to go see a dollhouse he had seen in a window in one of the shops in Old Town (I'm looking for a vintage dollhouse). It turned out the dollhouse was a church with stained glass windows that lit up (I didn't get a photo of it - I wish I did) and very old. Also, it was way out of my price range.

We meandered through so many antique shops and paused to listen to musicians playing on the street corners: a violinist whose companion was drawing beautiful zentangles on a white board; an acoustic folk band of young people and a group that was playing what looked like a giant wooden xylophone. I didn't take photos of that either (I am shy about doing so).

In one store we came across an old recipe box full of handwritten recipes in a lovely spidery handwriting with titles like Vicky's Salad, Holiday Pecan Pie and Dump Cake - actual Dump Cake...not the kind made with a boxed cake mix. The most exciting thing was a bit of diary tucked in among all the recipes:

We stood there reading it together, both of us a bit stunned that anyone would want to sell such a treasure. It actually hurt my heart. I have snippets of recipes from my late grandmother written on the backs of envelopes and a tiny grocery list scribbled on a torn scrap of paper - I would never part with them!

We felt like we wanted to honor this unknown woman who wrote down the snippets of this particular day of January 22, 1988 on a bit of paper and tucked it into her recipe box, so we took a picture. I would have bought it, but sadly, it was also a bit out of my range.

I wonder who she was, this woman who cooked beef and gravy over biscuits and eggs that day; who made note of the nuts and candies and spices on her "goodie shelf"? Did she have grand children that she baked for?

In it she mentioned that she got on a stool to change a lightbulb and fell, banging herself up and she looked like she had been "run through a mill". She also said they had gotten rain: "a good soak", but that it was good because they needed it. Apparently someone was helping her do some work on her house, but it "did not feel like home yet", but was getting there.

And that she made her best and favorite Coconut pie for dessert.

I wondered at the hands that held those recipes, the edges soft and bent with much use, circles of coffee or tea stains in tones of sepia on handwritten notes, the scribbled notes on the edges of many of them, like "file under oven". Curious!

Who had she prepared all of those dishes for? Why had she chosen that day to keep notes of her day and why were they tucked into her recipe box? And how did that treasure box end up on a small shelf in an antique store in Old Town?

I wonder what will happen to all of my recipes someday? I hate to think of them placed on a shelf in the corner of an antique store, gathering dust, forgotten.

So, I want to remember this woman who obviously loved to cook and treasured her recipe box so much that she tucked her daily diary into it for safe-keeping.

And then, today...back to snow. Spring just flashed us her leg and dashed off again! This morning we had big giant flakes of snow, very pretty and thankfully, none of it stuck:

This afternoon it looked like this:

Such a tease! And more of the same called for tomorrow.

How is the weather where you are? Has spring come or is she still just teasing you - or has she not shown up at all yet?

1 comment:

Oh what I'd give for even a tease! Still so bitter, cold and snowy way up here in the Great White North. Looking back at old pictures from a few years ago. March 10, open toed shoes, no snow on the ground! Forecast still calls for -20 for the foreseeable future! PHOOEY!

Stay Connected with Joyfully Donna

Most Viewed Posts

What are you looking for?

My Artsy Stuff

Don't miss any Joy!

"If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrariwise, what it is, it wouldn't be, and what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?"~ Alice in Wonderland

Make yourselves a nest of pleasant thoughts, bright fancies, faithful sayings; treasure-houses of precious restful thoughts, which care cannot disturb nor poverty take away from you, houses built without hands for your souls to live in.

~John Ruskin

Featured in The Working Girl's issue

and The Home-ing Issue

Stay, stay at home, my heart,and rest;Home-keeping hearts are happiest,For those that wanderthey know not whereAre full of trouble and full of care;To stay at home is best.~~ Longfellow ~~